Al-T’s makes crave-worthy Cajun food

Gumbo for breakfast, happy hour crawfish from the neighborhood bar, a midnight snack of grocery store boudin — nary a day goes by when we don’t give in to our Cajun food cravings.

In local dining, we’re overwhelmed with choices in this arena. But the key to finding a legitimate operation is to find out which restaurants actually make their Cajun staples in-house.

At Al-T’s, the house-made boudin and the name go back to 1978, when brothers Herbert and Harold Thibodeaux partnered with their cousin Alan Leger and opened a drive-in grocery in Hamshire. They put their names together to get Al-T’s and made boudin — a family recipe, of course — their signature item.

They sold the store in 1982 but continued to sell boudin for another couple of years. In 1984, Herbert had a wild notion and, with no previous experience, decided to open a Cajun seafood eatery and steakhouse by the same name.

Customers have regularly dined at Al-T’s for decades, some of them several times a week. Many are addicted to the buffet, served 10:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. every day. A small plate is $6.99 and large all-you-can-eat plate is $8.99.

Morgan Lewis is one of those regulars.

“I eat here every day for lunch,” she said. “I’ve been coming here for seven or eight years, ‘cause it’s good homestyle food. I have a list of my favorites: the chicken fried steak, hamburger steak, grilled pork chop and chicken and sausage gumbo. I go straight to the buffet and one of the ladies knows exactly what I want.”

Her friend Leslee Harmon shares her enthusiasm.

“I’ve been coming here about 10 or 11 years, probably every other day,” Harmon said. “I like the fried oysters, shrimp and fish and the etouffee. And their homemade fries.”

My pick for heavenly Cajun cuisine is the BC Special: a giant boudin ball deconstructed and topped with gumbo or etouffee. While the gumbo is tasty, I recommend this dish with crawfish or shrimp etouffee. The creaminess is a perfectly rich complement to the spicy boudin.

Like the boudin made in the smokehouse out back, the etouffee is made with a family recipe and you can buy it by the pound. The smokehouse also churns out tasso and crunchy pork cracklins, which are sold in bags at the front of the restaurant.

Although Herbert sold the restaurant to his brother Harold 14 years ago, he can still be found regularly at lunchtime, dining with his son Clinton and longtime friend, Bill Oday.

“The first few years were a hard time,” Herbert said. “Now sometimes I wish I hadn’t sold the place.”

Bill recalled Al-T’s heyday in the ‘90s, when they bought a limo to escort folks back and forth. Some of the more famous clientele have autographs lining the entryway wall.

“I drove that limo for 10 years,” Bill said. “I would pick up country stars like Mark Chesnutt and Tracy Byrd. I escorted Miss Texas at the Winnie Rice Festival. And we would pick up people at the Winnie Trade Days and bring them to eat.”

While the limo service is long gone, tradition and family still remains.

Carla Woodyard is part owner and has been the general manager for the past 14 years.

“The decor and the recipes are the same as they’ve always been,” she said. “We made a few changes to the menu and added parking lots and a front porch.”

It’s a good thing they did, because if the past 30 years are any indication, Al-T’s will be fulfilling customers’ Cajun food cravings for decades to come.